Is corporate social responsibility performance associated with tax avoidance?

Abstract

This study examines whether corporate social responsibility performance is associated with corporate tax avoidance. Employing a matched sample of 434 firm-year observations (i.e., 217 tax-avoidant and 217 non-tax-avoidant firm-year observations) from the Kinder, Lydenberg, and Domini database over the period 2003–2009, our logit regression results show that the higher the level of CSR performance of a firm, the lower the likelihood of tax avoidance. Our results indicate that more socially responsible firms are likely to display less tax avoidance. Finally, the results from our additional analysis show that the CSR categories community relations and diversity represent particularly important elements of CSR performance that reduce tax avoidance.

Roman Lanis, Grant Richardson